THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY

20150613 THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY

Isaiah 61:9-11

9 Their race will be famous throughout the nations and their offspring throughout the peoples. All who see them will admit that they are a race whom Yahweh has blessed.

10 I exult for joy in Yahweh, my soul rejoices in my God, for he has clothed me in garments of salvation, he has wrapped me in a cloak of saving justice, like a bridegroom wearing his garland, like a bride adorned in her jewels.

11 For as the earth sends up its shoots and a garden makes seeds sprout, so Lord Yahweh makes saving justice and praise spring up in the sight of all nations.

Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12

3 Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all the spiritual blessings of heaven in Christ.

4 Thus he chose us in Christ before the world was made to be holy and faultless before him in love,

5 marking us out for himself beforehand, to be adopted sons, through Jesus Christ. Such was his purpose and good pleasure,

6 to the praise of the glory of his grace, his free gift to us in the Beloved,

11 And it is in him that we have received our heritage, marked out beforehand as we were, under the plan of the One who guides all things as he decides by his own will,

12 chosen to be, for the praise of his glory, the people who would put their hopes in Christ before he came.

Gospel

Luke 2:41-51 ©

Every year the parents of Jesus used to go to Jerusalem for the feast of the Passover. When he was twelve years old, they went up for the feast as usual. When they were on their way home after the feast, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem without his parents knowing it. They assumed he was with the caravan, and it was only after a day’s journey that they went to look for him among their relations and acquaintances. When they failed to find him they went back to Jerusalem looking for him everywhere.

  Three days later, they found him in the Temple, sitting among the doctors, listening to them, and asking them questions; and all those who heard him were astounded at his intelligence and his replies. They were overcome when they saw him, and his mother said to him, ‘My child, why have, you done this to us? See how worried your father and I have been, looking for you.’

  ‘Why were you looking for me?’ he replied ‘Did you not know that I must be busy with my Father’s affairs?’ But they did not understand what he meant.

  He then went down with them and came to Nazareth and lived under their authority. His mother stored up all these things in her heart.

THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY

SCRIPTURE READINGS: ISA 61:9-11; EPHESIANS 1:3-6.11-12; LK 2:4-51

Yesterday, we celebrated the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  We focused on the love of God in Christ.  We contemplated on His heart of love and compassion.  Today, we celebrate the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

What is common between these two devotions is the use of the image of the heart.  In venerating the heart of a person, we venerate not so much the physical heart but what the heart symbolizes.

Nevertheless, our devotion to Mary must not be confused with our devotion to Jesus.  Whereas our devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is directed at the Heart of God whose love is overflowing for humanity, and which heart of love is often despised and rejected, in celebrating the immaculate Heart of Mary, we focus on what attracts us, especially her love for her Divine Son and for God, which includes her love for humanity especially for sinners.

To celebrate the immaculate heart of Mary is to understand the source of the interior life of Mary, her soul, her relationship with God and with others.  This includes understanding her joys and sorrows, her virtues and hidden perfections.   Above all, the heart of Mary is the perfect model of docility and obedience to the will of God and compassion for humanity.  Her heart is one of maternal love for her Son, and her motherly love for the Church.  This explains why the saints often speak of the Hearts of Jesus and Mary together, as their hearts are so inexplicably united in perfect conformity to the Father’s will.  Hence, John Eudes says that it is more accurate to speak about the one, single “Heart of Jesus and Mary.”

Mary’s heart is one with the Lord and for the Lord.  When Jesus told her, “Did you not know that I must be busy with my Father’s affairs?” she did not understand what He meant. However, she stored up all these things in her heart.  Obviously, things were not so clear to Mary.  But because she has a mother’s heart and loves her son, she was ever ready to support Jesus in His mission and to give Him the support even when He was misunderstood and betrayed by His own disciples.  Mary’s resolution to follow Jesus to the cross shows her union with her Divine Son and His mission.  She trusted in her Son as she did at Cana in Galilee.  “Do whatever He tells you” is a principle she gave to others and a principle she lived by as well.

What, then, is the heart of Mary? What was her interior life?  How did she feel and think?

In the first place, Mary’s heart always beat with joy for the Lord.  Both scripture readings speak about this joy. “My heart exults in the Lord, I find my strength in my God; my mouth laughs at my enemies as I rejoice in your saving help.” Mary’s heart was always filled with joy in the Lord.  We remember her joy at the annunciation, the visitation, the nativity, the offering of the child Jesus in the Temple and the finding of Jesus in the Temple. A true Christian is one who lives in faith and hope as expressed in the Magnificat.  Mary lived with the attitude of joy in her heart because of her faith and trust in the Lord.

The secret of her joy was her heart of faith. Mary in the New Testament is known as the woman of faith first and foremost.  Faith is to place oneself at the disposal of God, mind, heart and body.  There were many things that Mary could not understand.  It was too much for her.  But being a woman of prayer and contemplation, she was able to surrender.  For us, we need to understand to obey.  In the case of Mary, she obeyed on the word of God through the angel.  For her it was more important that she believed and obeyed than to understand.  Acceptance and fidelity were required from her, not understanding. When the time comes, she would understand.  And so in faith, she said to the angel, “I am the handmaid of the Lord, let what you have said be done to me.”  “Blessed is she that believed that the promises made to her would be fulfilled!” exclaims her cousin Elizabeth.  She trusted in the Lord totally at the annunciation, at Cana and even at the Cross.

Her joy came from her heart of compassion, which was thus pierced for our sake.  Mary, when presenting Jesus at the Temple, was already told in a prophecy by Simeon that a sword would pierce her heart.  For this reason, she is known as our Lady of the Seven Sorrows. In St Augustine’s understanding, Mary was not merely passive at the foot of the Cross but she cooperated through charity in the work of our redemption wrought by Christ in His death on the cross.  Mary’s compassion was already seen in the miracle of the wine at Cana in Galilee.  Her heart thirsts for us and for our salvation because she loves us like Jesus.  In all her apparitions, she urges us to conversion, especially in her apparition at Fatima.

Finally, her heart is one of humility.   Mary in union with Jesus’ heart is one of humility and meekness.  In the Magnificat, Mary recognized herself to be a lowly handmaid of the Lord and that her greatness was totally due to God’s grace in choosing her.   Because of her humility, she always rejoiced in God for she remained grateful throughout her life.  Gratitude is a sign of humility.  So great is the humility of Mary that forgetting her call as the mother of the Saviour, she went on with her life as if nothing had happened when she attended to the needs of her cousin, Elizabeth.  Only a humble person could be so obedient to the Word of God.

In her humility, she recognized that everything was because of the grace of God in the first place.  Mary understood that it was not so much her cooperation but the primacy of grace.  It is true that she cooperated with God’s grace, but unless the Lord loved her, she would not have been able to become what she was without the grace of God.  What makes her different from us is that she allowed the grace of God to work in and through her.

Where did she get all these from?  What was her secret?  It is her contemplative heart. 

Twice in the Gospel it is said that Mary “kept all these things in her heart.”  In other words, she prayerfully reflected all these things in her mind, lovingly meditating on the mysteries of faith.  Only in prayer, was she able to unite and identify herself with the mission of her Son.  In prayer, she came to love all whom Jesus loved.  Her heart was always focused and attentive to the Word of God.  Mary, who always pondered everything in her heart, is inviting us to do the same.

We have the same call to holiness and grace as well.  Indeed, just as God had chosen Mary from all eternity, so too the Lord has chosen us through His love.  He wants us now to respond and “to live through love in his presence” so that “we should become his adopted sons, through Jesus Christ for his own kind purposes, to make us praise the glory of his grace, his free gift to us in the Beloved, chosen to be, for his greater glory, the people who would put their hopes in Christ before he came.”   Indeed, no less than Mary, we are called to be members of Christ’s family.  We are called to share in His divine sonship by being the adopted sons and daughters of God.  God has created and chosen us for His greater glory so that we can lead others to Him.  We can live a life of grace through His love in our hearts.

What is our response to this call and grace? Do we have a heart of docility and receptivity like Mary?  Are we humble and obedient to His Word?  Do we have a heart of compassion and love like Mary?  To have such a heart like Mary, we need to cultivate a deeper interior prayer life to attune our hearts to hers.   Pope John Paul II says that training in holiness is to be trained in prayer especially contemplative prayer meditating on the mystery of Christ and Mary, that is the heart of Jesus and Mary.  It is of vital important for us if we want to grow in faith that we continually reflect on the events of our life and learn to see the hand of God in them so that we can continue to give praise to Him and most of all, obedient to Him.  Like her we must go to the upper room to invite the Holy Spirit to all afresh upon us.

Above all, we are invited to dedicate and consecrate our lives to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, that is, by following her heart of love, faith, humility and docility in loving her Son with all our heart.  So on this feast of the Immaculate Heart; let us follow Mary in loving Jesus and uniting our heart with His Sacred Heart.  Only by following her path, can we be sure of happiness, and a life of faith, hope and charity filled with the joy of the Lord.  Indeed, the crown of this feast and purpose is that we imitate Mary’s virtues and interior life symbolized by her heart.  In this way, we can truly say that she is our Mother and we are true disciples of her Son.

Written by The Most Rev William Goh

Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore

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